


Game Night

by AllThoseOtherWorlds



Category: Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, How I Met Your Mother
Genre: Barney can sing, Barney is Doctor Horrible, Episode s01e15 Game Night, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-06
Updated: 2015-04-06
Packaged: 2018-03-21 15:21:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3697238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AllThoseOtherWorlds/pseuds/AllThoseOtherWorlds
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU of Game Night. Instead of the song about Shannon, the tape contains videos from Barney's old blog - and the gang watches them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Game Night

**Author's Note:**

> **Notes:** Victoria is not in this, because I didn't want to include too many characters.
> 
>  **Disclaimer:** I do not own How I Met Your Mother.
> 
>  **Disclaimer the second:** Yes, I know this show is very problematic. For the purposes of this fanfic, we're pretending the characters aren't transphobic, misogynistic, etcetera. Barney still has a ton of sex, but he's less skeevy about how he gets it (he does do his acts, but he comes clean before it gets too far) and so forth. Yes, I tend to pretend things aren't as problematic as they really are. It makes me happy. Ted is still a bit of a douchbag, because my headcanon is that the problematic things we see in the show are mostly a product of him being an unreliable narrator.
> 
> And I like to headcanon that Barney is actually more socially-aware than people think he is, but that he pretends not to be to match his persona.

            "Okay, now it's your turn, Lilly," Marshal said, passing her the dice.

            "Oh! I just remembered," she said, partially because it was true and partially because she had no idea how to play this game, "I ran into someone the other day who wanted me to give this to you, Barney."

            "What?" He looked over at her. "What is it?" He smirked. "Is it her phone number?"

            "Actually, it's a homemade disk," she said. "We got to talking about clothing and I wanted to show her some of my stuff, so I pulled out my phone. You just so happened to be in the picture, and she went a bit ... weird."

            Barney looked nervous, now. "She did?" he asked. "Weird, how, exactly?"

            "I don't know what was going on," Lilly told him. "She kept talking about a Doctor ... terrible? horrid?"

            "Horrible!" Barney squeaked out. "I mean, that's horrible! Ha-ha."

            "No, I think it was. Doctor Horrible, she said," she confirmed. "She said that she'd 'saved the last few entries because you'd taken them down'? She thought you might like to have this."

            "Oh," Barney said, face unreadable. "Thanks Lilly. Could you give me the disk?"

            "Of course," she said, taking it out of her bag and passing it to him.

            "Thanks," he said, walking into the kitchen and out of sight. Then there came a loud cracking sound accompanied by Barney's voice.

            "Oh no, it's broken," he said, sounding completely unphased. "How disappointing."

            "Actually," Lilly smirked, pulling the real disk out of her bag. "Your reaction was sort of weird, so I gave you the wrong disk. This is the real one."

            Before he could respond she slipped the disk into the player and turned it on.

            Barney slumped into a chair and looked like he wanted the ground to swallow him whole.

            The others watched the screen avidly, gasping a little as the video loaded and a younger version of Barney appeared - wearing what appeared to be a lab coat and welding goggles.

            And then he laughed. "Mua-hahahaahaha," he tried. "hahahahaa... ha." He was silent for a moment, before saying, "So that's ... coming along."

            As they continued watching, the Barney-but-not-Barney kept speaking, reading his email and responding to it. Barney remained silent (but very clearly displeased), until the on-screen-Barney read an email about some girl and background music started playing.

            "Okay," he said. "That's enough." He practically leapt out of his chair, grabbed the disk out of the player, and stormed from the room, slamming the door behind him.

            The rest of the group stared at each other for a moment before Marshal spoke.

            "What was that?" he asked. "Is Barney some kind of supervillian?"

            "No," Robin scoffed. "He can't be. It was probably just some elaborate ruse to pick up that chick."

            "Then why did it seem to affect him so much?" Lilly asked.

            Nobody had an answer.

\---

            Barney remained off-radar for two nights before showing up at the bar on the third, slipping into his seat like nothing had happened.

            "Hey guys," he said. "What up?"

            "Hello, Barney," Lilly said.

            They gave him exactly five seconds before they started questioning him.

            "What was that video about?" Ted asked.

            Barney sighed. "Guys, really? I'm out of here."

            He got up and started to walk away, but stopped when Robin called to him.

            "Barney, wait! If you don't want to talk about it, at least give us the disk and let us finish watching it?"

            He turned back to them, considering. "Fine," he said. "Whatever. Just don't ... freak out. I've got better stuff to do than this anyway."

            He put the disk down on their table and left the bar.

\---

            Watching the rest of the video was ... something.

            "Who knew Barney could sing?" Marshal asked when it was finally over.

            "Who knew he could _sing?_ " Ted asked incredulously. " _That's_ what you're getting from this? Who knew he was an _evil scientist supervillian?_ "

            "Are we sure this is really Barney?" Robin asked. "I mean, there's the singing, the blinking thing, the _supervillian thing_ , the crush on a girl for ages thing... It doesn't sound much like him."

            "You saw how he reacted," Lilly said. "It had to be him. He must have changed after..."

            They fell silent for a moment, thinking of the last entry.

            "I suppose," Robin said softly.

            "Do you think he's still a supervillian?" Ted wondered. "I mean, we don't know what happened between the last entry and now."

            "Well, we still don't know what he does for a living," Marshal said. "It _could_ be the ... what was it? The League of Evil?"

            "The _Evil_ League of Evil."

            They all looked up in surprise to see Barney standing at the door, watching them with an inscrutable expression.

            "I guess you watched it, then?" he asked, taking in their faces.

            "Are you still a supervillian?" Ted blurted out. "Are you going to kill us now that we know?"

            Barney gave him his best 'How-did-you-come-up-with-that' look. " _No_ , I'm not going to kill you. If I hadn't been okay with you watching the DVD, I wouldn't have given it back to you."

            "Right," Ted said, settling down a little.

            "You still didn't answer his first question," Lily observed.

            "Right," he said. "Yes, I still work for the ELE. Kinda."

            "Kinda?" Marshal asked. "How can you be _kinda_ a supervillian?"

            “I didn’t say I was _kinda_ a supervillain,” Barney said, affronted. “I said I _kinda_ worked for the ELE.” He sighed, taking a seat. “I do technically work for them. But let’s just say I’m not necessarily all that _helpful_ to them. We have … fundamentally different goals.”

            “Different goals?” Robin echoed.

            “They want to destroy everything,” Barney explained. “Kill everyone and take whatever they want, live in luxury, blah blah blah. It’s all rather short-sighted, when you think about it.”

            “I can’t really say I’ve ever given much consideration to the motives of supervillains,” Ted said.

            “Really?” Marshal and Lilly asked at the same time.

            Ted blinked at them. “Is… that something you two have considered? Are you both supervillains too?”

            “No, we’re not supervillains,” Lilly said. “But have you really never thought about what you’d do if you had complete control over everything?”

            “Um, not really.”

            “Huh.” she shrugged, then looked back at Barney. “So, what are your goals?”

            “I can’t believe we’re having a civil conversation about this,” Ted muttered under his breath. Robin gave him a Look.

            “I want to overthrow the system,” Barney said, eyes lighting up as he began to talk. “Change everything. The way the world works now isn’t working for _anyone_. It’d be much better if I was in control of it. Anarchy, my guiding hand, and widespread social change.”

            “Isn’t that a bit of a contradiction?” Ted asked. “It can’t be an anarchy if you’re in control.”

            “Also, social change doesn’t sound like a particularly evil intention,” Robin noted.

            Barney glared at them. “It’s evil because I’m a supervillain,” he pointed out. “I’m opposing the system.”

            He made no move to explain Ted’s comment about anarchy. Privately, Robin thought he’d only used that word to make himself sound more evil. Ted thought Barney probably didn’t know what anarchy meant.

            “Okay, Barney,” Lilly said. “Whatever you say.”

            “So,” Marshal spoke up. “Why didn’t you tell us you could sing?”


End file.
